The general concept of trench drains is well known in the prior art. Trench drains are generally used to transport large amounts of liquid from one location to another. Typically, trench drains are used to collect liquid runoff from residential and commercial structures and deliver the runoff to a sewer system.
Current trench drains are typically modular in design and constructed of light weight polymers, such as fiberglass reinforced polyester. Typically, the trench drains consist of channels that have two sidewalls separated by a bottom wall. To install the trench drains, a trench is typically dug to a depth twice as deep as the height of the sidewalls, such that the top of the sidewall is about ⅛″ below the surrounding surface. Modular trench drain pieces, typically in about 1 meter lengths, are connected and sealed together. Concrete is poured in the bottom of the trench, the connected trench drain pieces are placed on top, and then concrete is poured around the trench drain up to a height approximately equal to the sidewall.
Because the top of a trench drain remains level, the slope is typically built into the channel itself. To accomplish this, each section of trench drain, as the drain slopes down, has higher sidewalls than the prior, adjacent section of trench drain. Thus, many different molds are needed to cast and form construct each section of the sloping trench drain. Suppliers will also need to keep a supply of each different section of sloping channel.